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April 7, 2013

What a beautiful day to play outside – and to paint outdoors! Today, my little makers decided to paint their cardboard robots with spare paint we had in our garage. We gathered the blue, green, and pink paints – and chalkboard paint, too – and headed outdoors to paint the robots the girls are prototyping. They had so much fun painting, they also decided to paint their cat house they made from macaroni boxes and the toy car they made from an amazon cardboard box. Below are some descriptions of each bot they are prototyping:

Storage-bot: Large “bot” with a head that opens and a body that opens so toys or other valuables can be kept in a safe place. Samantha also found out that her cat also found the storage-bot to be a great place to snooze! If she had had the funding, she’d like this robot to have a metal structure for head and body – with locker doors for the front and top of the head. She also would planned for it to have a motor and wheels in order for it to move about – however, she hasn’t decided whether it would be remote control or programmed to move without a remote.

Grassy-bot: Small “bot” with one long and one short arm and a head that is open on top. This bot would help plant grass seed – so it would also need wheels and ‘hands’ to scoop the seed from the top of its head or dump it from the top. Olivia decorated her bot with blue-green paint and sprinkled grass all over the wet paint. He also plans to paint the front of it with chalkboard paint, so she can write on it!

This was not the first time the girls have painted outdoors – they helped paint their lemonade stand last year – so they were aware that painting outdoors can be difficult with wind and dust. Olivia learned that she could mix the paint a little to make stripes with two different colors. She also went with the wind and added to her bot what Mother Nature had blown on it – more grass! Samantha learned that spray paint can be difficult to control with wind – but was able to figure out a way to complete her project. Both girls will be sharing their bots at the Robotics House this Friday at their Open House! Here’s to hoping they are inspired by all the robotics around them!

{Big Makers}

While the little makers were painting, the {big makers} were busy doing a couple of projects, too – my husband stopped making a website and started on fixing his computer. I am in the process of making a knitted bag for one of my girls and making photographs of their projects (which I hope they’ll post to their blogs – that we are all building together) – I have also become very engaged in making paper clothing for ‘paper dolls’ – using scrapbook paper and templates to design different outfits. All of the items I make are more for fun, R&R, and decor – while my husband makes/fixes things that can be used by the entire household. Here’s to a great start of the week – and to more making each and every day!